ALTER.NATION #95
Margo Price, Throwing Muses, Soko, Soft Plastics, Paint, The Beths, Kestrels, Patricia, Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper, 9th Wonder, Kamasi Washington, Brian Blade, Christian McBride, Brad Mehldau, Joshua Redman, Bettye LaVette, Z Berg
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"Twinkle Twinkle"
ALTER.NATION #95 on deezer
Margo Price - That's How Rumors Get Started / Twinkle Twinkle
...Price hired Sturgill Simpson as producer and he helped assemble a group of studio pros who are names in their own right, including keyboardist Benmont Tench, bassist Pino Palladino, and guitarist Matt Sweeney. The ensemble plays with an elegant elasticity throughout That's How Rumors Get Started, letting ballads swell to an emotional crescendo but also happy to settle into a country-soul groove or slather on the fuzz guitars, as they do on "Twinkle Twinkle."...
Throwing Muses – Bo Diddley Bridge
Earlier this year, Throwing Muses, the great long-running Boston alt-rock band, announced plans to release their new album Sun Racket... We’re still waiting, but now Throwing Muses have set a new release date. They’ve also shared “Bo Diddley Bridge,” another great new track. “Bo Diddley Bridge” does not have a Bo Diddley beat, as cool as that would be. Instead, it’s a thick, enveloping, atmospheric jam with a whole lot of teeth. The song gets a whole lot out of bandleader Kristin Hersh’s tough, instinctive wail, which has been one of the greatest sounds in American underground rock for decades.
Soko - Feel Feelings / Blasphémie
...The clarity she gained from the experience is reflected on Feel Feelings, which flows with the sudden, intuitive understanding of a breakthrough. Soko's emotions -- loss, joy, and above all, self-awareness -- spill into each other over music that's just as uninhibited... On songs such as "Blasphémie," the rounded bass line and tumbling melody evoke Serge Gainsbourg's Histoire de Melody Nelson (not coincidentally, this is Soko's first song en Français)... Soko demands the same commitment from her listeners that she put into making these songs, but as she combines happiness and sadness into something beautiful, the honesty in her music is mesmerizing.
Soft Plastics - 5 Dreams / St Tosh the Actor
Carey Mercer is back! Just two years after the glorious art-rock ensemble Frog Eyes dissolved into the ether, Vancouver's favorite troublemaker surfaces today with company as Soft Plastics, a band/project both sonorous in annunciation and, obviously, provocative in execution. Listeners don't have to wait long to cue the drooling. On the very first song, "St. Tosh the Actor", Mercer rolls out that bizarrely affecting, signature croon – part David Bowie, part Stephen Prina, all fused with Baroque-tinged LSD – over shuffling percussion, occasional guitar, addictively juicy bits of synth and even a mature hot-summer-night moan courtesy of J.P. Carter's trumpet...
PAINT - Spiritual Vegas / Strange World
Not surprisingly for someone who's main musical gig is playing in the psychedelically relaxed Allah-Las, Pedrum Siadatian's first album recorded under the name PAINT was as laid back as a cat stretched out in a beam of light. The second PAINT album has the same basic ingredients -- wobbly guitars, vintage keys, plenty of Kevin Ayers/Syd Barrett influence, Siadatian's lazy drawl of a voice -- and similarly home cooked, mid-fi sound...
The Beths - Jump Rope Gazers / I'm Not Getting Excited
... Written between tours and recorded in late 2019 and early 2020 (again with guitarist Jonathan Pearce producing), the follow-up, Jump Rope Gazers, was heavily inspired by trying to maintain friendships from thousands of miles away. Bandleader Elizabeth Stokes has noted that even when they were at home, she was at an age where friends were scattering all over the world... Even with tracks like these and more-mid-tempo rockers, Jump Rope Gazers isn't without its share of jammers. Among them is the urgent opening track, "I'm Not Getting Excited," which delves into the anxiety of imposter syndrome with buzzy guitars, crashing cymbals, starts and stops, and a wide-ranging melody...
Kestrels - Dream or Don't Dream / Everything Is New
...With the help of longtime Dinosaur Jr. producer John Agnello and drummer Michael Catano, Peck turned those songs into grungy dreamgaze gold. They dial the shoegaze portion of the proceedings down to the occasional flanged wave of distortion, while coating the guitars with mammoth amounts of pedals, often in the same configuration J Mascis utilizes... Peck's no slouch at the game either, and some of his six-string maneuvers stack up nicely with his hero's. His work on "Everything Is New" sounds like it could be one of Mascis' more inspired solos from the Green Mind era, for example... It's not just a trip on a time machine, though; Kestrels manage the balancing act between heartfelt nostalgia and bracing modernity as easily as a Wallenda walks between buildings.
Patricia - Maxyboy / Myokymia
Max Ravitz's early releases as Patricia frequently contained the types of smudged, hazy tones and scuzzy kick drums prevalent in what was often termed "outsider house" at the time... Shifting a bit from the techno and house framework of his more club-friendly releases, this album often ventures into IDM and electro, with the rapidly skittering beats of "Myokymia" providing an airy but weighty rhythm... Maxyboy demonstrates Ravitz's versatility as a producer, showcasing his ability to skillfully, creatively express a wide range of moods while bucking the conventions of house and techno.
Kamasi Washington, Robert Glasper, Terrace Martin, and 9th Wonder have released their debut self-titled album as Dinner Party. In a press release, the band’s origin story is explained as the intersection of authentic connection and musical camaraderie. “Dinner Party is years of friendship, shows, dinners, conversations, laughs and life experience, all converging into one moment,” it reads. “Dinner Party is a metaphor — a group, a project, a spirit, an imprint of time — and also the name of the album… Dinner Party is invite only, but it’s for everyone.”
While they have continued to work together in various incarnations throughout their careers, RoundAgain is the first proper recording by the quartet in over two decades... In some ways, RoundAgain feels like the perfect follow-up to MoodSwing, an album that could have arrived in the late '90s. Yet, it is hard to imagine Redman and his quartet summoning the same warmth and relaxed intensity that they do here without the decades of experience and deep familiarity they've cultivated with each other over the years.
Bettye LaVette – Strange Fruit
On her forthcoming album Blackbirds, 74-year-old soul singer Bettye LaVette covers songs recorded by the legendary Black female artists that came before her: Dinah Washington, Nina Simone, Nancy Wilson, Della Reese, Ruth Brown. And now she’s shared her rendition of “Strange Fruit,” the powerful anti-lynching anthem popularized by Billie Holiday. “It really is horrifying that nearly 80 years later, through Billie’s lifetime and now my 74 years, the meaning of this song still applies,” LaVette writes in a statement. “It might not be men and women hanging from trees, but these public executions are now on video and it feels like they’re doing it for sport. I hope the song will be a reminder that we have had enough, and I support the Black Lives Matter movement.”
Z Berg - Get Z to a Nunnery / Charades
Producer: Ethan Gruska
Get Z to a Nunnery is the surprising solo debut of Z Berg (aka Elizabeth Berg), onetime leader of L.A. outfits the Like, JJAMZ, and Phases. It's unexpected because she forgoes the Like's garage rock as well as the punchy hooks of her other bands for a brooding, vintage sound that combines vocal-era torch song and classic baroque pop for a set more suited to the nightclub than the bar or festival stage. In fact, the album's theatrical quality and restrained, string-based arrangements seep into one another in a way that feels more like a song cycle of melancholy love lessons than a track list...
Margo Price, Throwing Muses, Soko, Soft Plastics, Paint, The Beths, Kestrels, Patricia, Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper, 9th Wonder, Kamasi Washington, Brian Blade, Christian McBride, Brad Mehldau, Joshua Redman, Bettye LaVette, Z Berg
